Bills Posts

To me, It seems barely credible that I have now been doing this for 100 days. Back at No. 90 I expressed some doubt as to whether I should celebrate there, or here. Let’s do neither, but just put a marker in time. The next one will at 122. I can do that, as it is a leap year, Let’s just say that I’m really chuffed to be here.

We went for a walk this morning, down to the waterfront. We took a slightly indirect route down Mumby Road, rather than the town centre, which we wanted to avoid. On the way down, we paused to take a look at the tunnel through the remains of the ramparts. Queen Victoria used to travel along that little bit of rail track, heading towards Clarence Yard, for the boat over to the Isle of Wight, ending up at Osborne House. I knew the track was there, but had been sceptical about the tunnel. As we walked along the road though, I realised that it wasn’’t just undergrowth that obscured the view through the fence, there was a very steep bank, which could only have been part of the ramparts were built in the 17th & 18th century.

We headed on down to the waterfront, taking a stroll out to the end of the Haslar Marina Pier Wall. When we got there we were rewarded with seeing one of the Bunkering ships, the Whitonia. She was heading out with the plimsoll line well up, so she had been busily refuelling the likes of the ferries. Presumably heading back up to Southampton to re-load.

Afterwards, we went back to the promenade, where we found a sheltered seat, as it was just a little bit breezy. We sat and ate our sandwiches and fruit, and just watched people for a bit. Most people seemed quite cheerful and said hello as they went past.

It was very nice to get out for a bit.

I nearly didn’t go for a walk this morning. I woke up at around 10 to 6. If I had lingered I would have felt it too late to go. That would have been a pity. I’ve only managed to get out three times this week. I do have problems getting up sometimes. But I always enjoy them when I do, even if it rains during the time out.

What I am not seeing much of, whilst out, is shipping. I’m catching many fewer Brittany ferries than was normally the case. Occasional sights of the bunkering ships the Janey W and Whitchampion still come in to the harbour, but I don’t see them very often at all now.

These two ships though, the Mary Mouse 2, which is always there there. It used to be an active lightship (which probably stating the obvious, given the giant light on top) and whilst I don’t know how it is doing now, it is a very nice restaurant, serving some very food.

Now, the other ship, the EGS Pioneer is also a bit interesting it’s a survey vessel. It has some quite sophisticated equipment on board. I don’t know what it has been surveying. I’m sure it’s being useful also.

The picture was taken on last years trip to London. I thought it was quite amusing. At the beginning of the week I set myself a mission; I laid out seven topics, and I was to write about them in no particular order over the course of the week. Tonight’s topic is writing.

Perhaps not unsurprisingly, It’s not that I have found it stressful to write something, I think it is probably that I actually do have to think about what I’m writing, andd having to stick to some kind of schedule. Of course, as I get to the end of the week the scope of what I can write about decreases, forcing me to focus even more.

So, having reviewed from 94, I haven’t brilliantly, at least two of the topics; the story of art and photography have been the subject their own posts. Other topics like the weather, and the waterfront have been shared around a bit between other posts. So, a partial success.

So, I’m wondering if I should have another go. I need to find a range of topics that I am comfortable writing about. Do I need a kind of standing agenda? I have a reason for that – It’s because of a project I’m developing.

I think there is a point up until which, it is almost impossible to separate art from religion, it was a tool that was used to illustrate religious events. The 16th Century introduced the reformation. I haven’t really looked at the reformation, I’d heard of it of course, but not having looked in to it, I had no understanding. A little bit of research reveals knowledge.

Artists that were famous at the time, and famous now. Lorraine, Rubens, Van Dyck, Poussin. The book is fascinating, and it is certainly making me think about art, and I am looking forward to being able to go to a gallery, especially if it features some of the pictures discussed in the book, so that’ll probably be London then, so can’t see that happening for a while.

I’m now on page 430, not far off two thirds of the way through. Right at the very beginning of the book, Gombrich gives a warning about judging art. Reading the book does not qualify you for doing that. Knowing some of the trials that artists went through will, I think make me appreciate the artist more that what I have done.

I acknowledge that the two pictures weren’t taken at the same time of day, from the same angle, at the same time of year. But they are sufficiently close that they will do for my purpose.

That purpose is to compare the normal and night modes on the P20 Pro.

For whatever reason I haven’t played with the night mode and now I think I need to explore it a bit more. So, which picture is which?

The bottom picture is Normal, the top is with the night mode.

It’s not just this picture, but also this one;

Taken only a few minutes before. In both cases the colours are deeper and richer. I like them both, and that makes me want to explore the mode further. I am also now asking if the mode could be used for astrophotography. So I am hoping for a clear sky in the morning to test this. But the weather forecast is for cloudy skies so probably not in the morning.

This picture was taken October last year. We had a lovely day in London. Sometimes it’s nice to look back to remember good times.

I didn’t go for a walk this morning. I woke up around 6:15 ish. I’ve previously explained the self imposed problem I have getting out of the house by 0610.

In a recent post, I wrote something along the lines of that’s I have been walking to the waterfront and taking pictures of the same scene. You would think I’d get bored with it. Well, sometimes I do. Thrash’s why occasionally I might take a morning off, or change my route. The thing is though that I almost invariably end up at the waterfront – because it is lovely and interesting.

I also wrote about sometimes needing motivation to get up and get out. Two of the best ways of doing this are to look out the window and see a lovely morning developing. The other way is to have an objective for the walk. Frustratingly, I did have an objective – which I will carry over to tomorrow. No, I’m not going to tell you what it is. I have been dropping the occasional hint, but I’m not yet ready to reveal. But, I do have a plan.

I’ve seen the small single person sailboats with a hydrofoil. But it is only recently that I’ve noticed surfboards, whether sail, or kite, with a hydrofoil. The reduction in friction means that these things can reach sixty miles an hour. It’s amazing to see. I’m not tempted to indulge though.

Up until about an hour ago, it has absolutely chucked it down. We haven’t left the house, except to put food on the bird table and rubbish in the bin. Just pottered about really. I should have spent time getting my radio shack sorted, but I’ve been having a bit of a mare installing Big Sur – got it done eventually, but it wasn’t straight forward. In a way the problem lay with me choosing too low a spec machine.

It’s Saturday, we decided that there weren’t any house jobs we felt we had to do. So, we’ve had a a bit of a relaxing day. That’s OK, I won’t complain about that. Not long before lunch, I suggested that it would be quite nice if we went back to the waterfront at Titchfield Haven. I had an ulterior motive, partially. I wanted to shoot some video in what are some quite wild conditions. As you can see from the photo, not massive waves, but enough to show that there was quite a breeze blowing. The wind was driving the intermittent showers quite strongly, the rain felt like needles hitting my face. I have to say though, that I was enjoying being out.

I have to say that I thoroughly enjoyed the 30 or so minutes that I spent on the waterfront, there’s a bit of a shingle bank that is walkable when the tide is low, so I took the opportunity to get out as far as I could – not far, only about a hundred yards, if that. It gave me an opportunity to speak to a couple of the surfers as they were preparing to go out. They were friendly and keen to speak. One had only been doing it for a couple of weeks. Wasn’t going out very far, but was keen to get out.

There’s something to be said, I find, for being out in wild weather. There’s just something about it that really appeals to me. Lunch was lovely, Tuna Mayo rolls, making the whole expedition a very enjoyable experience.

The morning skies are getting darker. It won’t be long before my entire morning walk will take place at night. Every day, the length of the daylight or night changes by at least a couple of minutes per day. The light over the Haslar Marina had a strangle very delicate glow to it, quite unusual.

Now, this is strange. All of a sudden, I can’t think of what to write, and so of course my ultimate fallback is to write about that. Why that should suddenly happen, I’m not sure. Usually, I try and think about the blog a little bit during the day, and usually a thought will come to me for the topic of the evening post. Today, the only thing that came to me was was the photograph at the head of this post. But then, having started to write about, I have dried up.

The weather forecast last night indicated that it was very likely to rain at about 7AM, there’s alway’s a bit uncertainty there , so it may have rained on me. Luckily it didn’t. In fact, what I think was supposed to be a bit of a storm, turned into not even a damp squib. That made it a nice walk as usual.

Not too bad considering I pretty much stopped at the end of the first para. Unfortunately, you can expect this to happen again.

I’ve been walking this route for almost four years now would you believe, 5 days a week for the most part. All year round, the exceptions are rain, holidays, illness, and over-sleeps. I’ve probably accumulated not far short of 20,000 pictures of the same subject. Well not really, the same area, but each picture is unique it’s own way. I would quite like to do a 365 day project of the same scene; either a street scene or the waterfront. I don’t think I can commit to that, not because I literally couldn’t do it, but factors would inevitably intrude. I’d inevitably miss a picture for one reason or another, and that is the project ended effectively.

I have to say that whilst I am typing this, I’m sat watching the Joy of painting. To be honest, we are open mouthed at Bob Ross, he makes it look so easy. Are his pictures formulaic? I neither know or care – they are effective. Apparently our neighbour is doing it. We really must ask him for an exhibition.

I hope you haven’t realised that, from my writing, as I sat to write this evening I couldn’t think of what to talk about. I’m happy with this.